1. Upping our game the way forward for investigative interviewing
Dr. Becky Milne
Centre of Forensic Interviewing
University of Portsmouth

2. What is an investigator’s job: reactive investigation?
Two Primary investigative questions:
What happened? If anything did happen?
Who committed the offence?
Milne and Bull (2006)

3. How do investigators answer these two primary investigative questions?
Gather information from a number of sources (Kebbell & Milne, 1998)
People
Interview is pivotal – wide definition
Performance measure: quality and quantity of information - contamination
Interviewer behaviour

4. Importance of interviewing: suspects
Miscarriages of Justice (Cardiff 3 etc).
Central to acquittal - police interview with suspects
McGurk et al (1994) - most frequent task
Milne and Bull (1999) - most important job
Limited guidance to do this ethically
PACE and PEACE developed
Minimal training around the globe

5. Aim of PEACE
“Course aimed to ensure that the basic interviewing skills necessary to apply the model were developed for the interviewing of all interviewees (witnesses, victims and suspects) with integrity and in accordance with the law. Shaw (1996)

6. Did PEACE work? – suspects Clarke and Milne (2002)
P&P: average skill level
Engage & Explain:
Good: conform to legal requirements
Poor: check understanding of caution
interview process and purpose
rapport
Account: average skill level
Good: self-confident and communication skills
relevant topics and questioning
Poor: Summaries, links and challenges
Closure: poor skills level

7. PACE (1984): Sections 76 or 78 10% (17) breaches
5 oppression
Undue pressure and bullying
Continual challenge
3 mental health issues
7 legal requirements
Failure to caution
Explanations missing concerning legal advice
2 other
Background noise
Overuse leading questions

8. PEACE and counter-fraud
Formally adopted for public sector fraud investigations in 1990s
Walsh & Milne (2006) – DWP
99 interviews benefit fraud suspect interviews
Good use of open questions- facilitated info from suspect
Legal and ethical
Poor rapport
Poor planning
Not covering points to prove sufficiently
Lack summaries
Reasons for committing offence

9. Shawyer & Milne (2009) Questionnaire and examined actual interviews
DWP and police fraud interviews/ers
Advantages
‘…it focuses the mind on the interview with crib notes. It helps on the format and flow of questions…’ (DWP)
Disadvantages
‘…PEACE in (some) cases is often a “sledgehammer to crack a nut”…’ (DWP)

10. Performance in interviews
Planning and prep. – good performance
Rapport – poor
Checked caution understanding appropriate
Use of questions poor
Few open questions
Majority appropriate closed
Some leading
Closure adequate

11. Walsh & Milne (2007)
Questionnaire to investigators and managers – views
General support
Is it effective?
Time
Inflexibility of the model
Supervisory framework to ensure standards

12. The importance of witnesses/victims
Sanders (1986) - central and most important feature of criminal investigations
Kebbell and Milne (1998) - central leads
Milne and Bull (1999) - cornerstone of investigation
often no other forensically relevant info.
Planning and preparation prior to suspect interview
outlines areas to prove an offence
determines possible offenders

13. Interviewing was poor
Limited use CI or CM
Closed questioning style
Interviewer driven and confirmatory
Clarke & Milne (2002) “far more leading questions asked, most interviewers didn’t allow the witness to tell their account and the interviews were mainly police led”

14. ACPO Five Tiers Tier 1: Probationer and police staff
Tier 2: Uniform investigators & detectives
Tier 3: Specialist Interviewers
Tier 4: Interview manager (supervision)/PIP
Tier 5: Specialist interview management and co-ordination

15. Do the Tiers work?: Suspects Griffiths and Milne (2005)
Study one – Does advanced interviewing work?
49 AIs examined – assessment
Pre and post training examination – simulations
Improvements across all skill areas

16. Pre- training Post- Mean SD Overall 3.18 0.31 4.19* 0.35 2.68 0.53
E&E
2.68
0.53
4.15*
Legal Beh
3.95
0.46
4.54*
0.30
Rapport Behs
1.96
0.75
3.96*
0.42
Account
2.83
0.50
4.08*
0.48
Topics
2.96
0.54
4.02*
0.61
Summarising
2.33
0.77
3.90*
0.78

17. Do the Tiers work?: Suspects Griffiths and Milne (2005)
Study two –
Do skills transfer to real life?
Do the skills stay over time?
End of course baseline vs real life within 6 months (mean 3 months) vs real life 10 months plus (mean 19 months)
27 AIs = 81 interviews
Transference immediately into the workplace
Skill erosion seen over time

18. Post-training Real-life Time 1 Real-life Time 2 Mean (SD) 4.12 (0.34)
E&E
4.12 (0.34)
4.08 (0.35)
3.81 (0.52)*
Legal Beh
4.54 (0.31)
4.58 (0.25)
4.50 (0.29)
Rapport Behs
3.91 (0.41)
3.73 (0.51)
3.45 (0.80)*
Account
3.94 (0.76)
3.81 (0.76)
3.55 (0.80)*
Topics
3.91 (0.72)
3.88 (0.93)
3.74 (0.84)
Summarising
3.68 (0.66)
3.40 (0.98)
2.89 (1.23)*

19. Conclusions: the future
Front-line interviews:
Dando, Wilcock, Milne & Henry (2010): quick and not complex
Telephone exchange – call handling
Technology
Counter-fraud specific interview model?
Detecting deceit
Using the ECI – reverse order recall (Vrij, Mann, Fisher, Leal, Milne & Bull, 2008)